I finally got internet in my office!!

September 8, 2008

Last Friday, my boss told me there would be training today. At first, I figured it would be something to do with my job, and I was kind of looking forward to it. When I later asked what kind of training it would be, she told me that it would be about cooking, put on by a Norwegian NGO that is here. So, during my lunch break, that’s what I did. I don’t know the name of any of the foods, but I think they were all supposed to be Japanese. It was stuff like batter-fried vegetables, batter-fried cabbage, “salads” (read: slaw), steamed vegetables, and some fried meat. The best part was that we got to eat it. It wasn’t bad, but I don’t see myself making any of it. All those Mongolian women seemed to be intrigued by what was going on. I don’t think they batter anything; and they fry very little. I was one of three males, and one of them was a young boy who was there, I’m sure, because his mother had nowhere else to leave him. The other guy was just there, not doing much. The women looked amused because I was there and acted interested. Needless to say, men don’t do much cooking here. They do when they have to, but not much.

September 9, 2008

There was a surprise in my inbox, when I checked my email this morning. Peace Corps administration sent out an update telling everyone they got a raise. Yay! Every year, Volunteers are given forms to fill out, to see how much money they spent on things, to assess whether they had enough for the things they need. The last group must have done it right. I got a raise of 45,000tg per month (around $39). Some of this is because my site’s status has changed. Before, I wrote how I got paid countryside wages, though I still had to buy my stuff in the city. They have taken that into account and I’m now being paid special wages for people who are in that kind of situation. Yay, again! I’m very excited about this.

Now I can go buy another power strip and steamer. They both just blew. I don’t know what the problem is with cheap power strips here. This time, though, I think it was the steamer. When I plugged it into the power strip, the power strip blew. When I plugged it into the wall, the steamer blew, instantly melting the wire in two. Both times scared the crap out of me. Now I’m going to have to do some rearranging for a day or two, so my refrigerator can be plugged in. I guess I haven’t mentioned that I only have two electrical outlets in my whole apartment. Did you know that in houses in the U.S., houses are supposed to, by code, have an electrical outlet every 12 feet? I’m guessing there are no kinds of rules like that here. There is one outlet in my living room that has a place for one thing to be plugged in. The other outlet is in the kitchen, with a place for two things to plug in. And neither of them takes the kind of plug that has a ground wire attached. I guess that will be one of the things that I ask my boss to fix.

September 10, 2008

Today was my dentist appointment in the city. After stopping at Cafe Amsterdam for a chocolate mocha, I made it to the Peace Corps office around 12, giving me plenty of time to relax for a bit. My appointment was at 1, so I figured I had plenty of time since I would be taking a taxi to the dentist office. Around 12:30, I called a taxi to pick me up. It finally got there around 1:15. Traffic was backed up and crazy. To go 4.6km (3.4 miles), it took about 20 minutes. Luckily, the dentist office was expecting me and I went right in. I don’t know what I was expecting, but I was very surprised to see that everything was state of the art. When the dentist started looking around in my mouth, she could only find a very old chip that I didn’t even know about; nothing that could’ve been from what I’d thought. She decided to fix it. It’s taken me a bit to get used to the feeling, but I’m glad it’s done. I guess that piece of what I thought was my tooth was in the sandwich I’d eaten. Back at the PC office, it took a while to fill out all the reimbursement forms. I was reimbursed for my travel expenses, but since I was just there for the day, I didn’t receive any per diem. No big deal. I found a cheap restaurant to buy my lunch/dinner. The tsuivan was very good.

While at the PC office, I got to check out several books. They have all kinds of resource books, and since I am having a hard time finding a Mongolian tutor, I’ve decided to take my language acquisition into my own hands. I got four books, three of which have CD-ROMs. They will help a lot, if I have the discipline to use them. I also got five books for pleasure. I’m really excited about them. Matt has been telling me about Robert Jordan’s Wheel of Time series forever, so I got the first four of them. The fifth one is Musashi, a Japanese book. I’ve heard of that character from video games. I had no idea it was a book. I guess I’ll see what it’s all about. That will give me something fun to read for a while.

On the way home, we stopped at a flower store. I bought a little yellow cactus. I thought I’d like to have some kind of plant in my apartment, and I figured a cactus should be pretty easy to take care of. We’ll see if that’s true.

Now it’s close to my bedtime, and I’m really tired. Walking across the city as much as I do, I tend to get worn out since I usually have a backpack with several things in it to weigh me down. It makes me tough though, so I’m not complaining, too much. It just helps me get in the bed early, so I can get some good rest.

September 11, 2008

My work day was filled with computer games. My boss was gone to the city for the day, so there was nothing for us to do. I don’t know who had that computer before they gave it to me, but I don’t see how they got any work done. Warcraft III is on there, and it’s quite addictive. I did take a couple of breaks to go outside and watch the youth basketball games that were going on. Today was the kids’ day of our Naadam.

As I was leaving for the day, I saw the governor in the hall and he ushered me into the conference room. Most everyone else was already in there, including a local congressman. The congressman said some kind speech about something, and then went around with a bottle of China’s national vodka and gave everyone a shot. I don’t know what the difference is, but I could taste it. It didn’t taste like regular vodka. After everyone had two shots to finish that bottle, they pulled out a big bottle of Chinggis: Mongolia’s national vodka. We drank that until it was gone, too. Luckily, there were about 20 or so people in there to share with. When we left, we went over to the new kindergarten for the ribbon cutting ceremony. The congressman and the governor gave another quick speech before we went in. Again, like the first time I went with my boss, there were ladies there tying plastic bags around our shoes before we went into the building. After a quick tour, we went into a big room set up with tables and all kinds of food and drink. Every two or three seats, there were two or three bottles of vodka, liqueur, or wine. It was a party for all the local directors. We sat down and I gorged myself. I knew I was going to be pressured into drinking more, so I wanted to mitigate its effects as much as possible. Sure enough, when most everyone was finished eating, the serving ladies started opening bottles of vodka and pouring everyone a shot. At first, after the prerequisite toast, everyone took a shot together. After that, someone else gave a toast and we went around the circle, taking shots one by one. I don’t know why, but they always get a kick out of it when I just turn it up and don’t make much of a yuck-face. Then, it seemed like every time we took one shot, someone else wanted to toast something for another shot. Finally, the two old ladies I was sitting between decided to leave, so I made my moves with them.

Outside, in the “square,” there was a concert. The band was pretty good, even if I didn’t know any of the songs. People were all in a good mood and dancing. Mongolian dancing is a bit different than what I’m used to, though. They do one of two things. One way is that they get into what I call the classic “DZ circle.” There are those of you out there who know what I’m talking about, but for those of you who don’t, they get in a big circle and just dance. It’s not as exclusive as the DZ’s make their circle, but it’s still reminiscent. To my favourite DZ: I couldn’t help but think of you. Every once and a while, some drunk guy would get in the middle and dance around. The other way they dance is to do a type of waltz. I was trying to stay away from that, but one lady found me and asked me to dance with her. I told her I didn’t really know how, but she persisted and proceeded to tell me how as we were doing it. It’s not hard, but the whole turning thing gets me. Have you heard that saying, “he dances like he has two left feet?” That’s how I felt when trying to do that dance. After that, about three or four more ladies asked me to dance. One of them was really good, and quite patient, and said that I did a good job. I think she was just being nice. Every time, I would look down at my feet, worried about stomping my clod-hoppers on her dainty feet, but she kept saying, “Look up! Look up!” My boss told me later that people told her that she should teach me the Mongolian dance. I laughed and agreed.

When it was all over, it was almost 1 o’ clock, and I’d hoped to come home and go to bed. But, since our department was the one to set everything up, we had to stay there to “supervise” the band’s clean up. By supervise, I mean watch. I carried one speaker for them, but I don’t really count that as doing anything. I was glad when it was all over. I’ve been extra tired today, for some reason. Tomorrow will be full, too. I don’t have to be ready until 10, though, so that’s good.

September 14, 2008

What a crazy fun weekend I’ve had. I’ve been on the go so much that I haven’t had time to write, so let me see if I can catch you up on some things now.

Friday morning, I woke up and took my time getting ready. Everyone from my office was planning to meet at 10 to go out to the Naadam field. Right as the microbus was getting ready to leave, I got a call from Peace Corps. They were having emergency evacuation procedure practice and I had to get to my consolidation point in UB as soon as possible. Dang it! I had so been looking forward to Naadam and now I was going to miss it. To make it worse, everyone here was involved in the Naadam festivities and all that entails, so there were no cars or microbuses going to the city; and it was too late to get the train to take me. I had planned my day and then those plans were disrupted, and I was frazzled on trying to figure out how to get to where I needed to be. Eventually, when I got my boss to understand that it wasn’t something that I could put off until later, or the next day, I quickly came to my apartment and packed a weekend bag (but forgot a few things I’d wished I’d had). She got a policeman to take me out to the main road. There, he flagged down the first car that came by and told them to take me into the city. That’s one good thing about working in the government and having those connections, I guess. Surprisingly, the car wasn’t full, so I had a fairly comfortable ride. Wouldn’t you know it: we got a flat tire about half way there. Guess what else. The driver didn’t have a jack. We stood on the side of the road trying to flag vehicles to stop for us for a while before a truck finally pulled over. He had the requisite jack, but it didn’t go quite high enough to put the new tire on. As I was thinking, “You’re going to have to do something to get the car higher so you can get that tire on,” the driver seemed to have read my mind. His unspoken reply was to get a shovel out of his trunk and dig out a trench under the wheel so the tire would go right on. Ingenious! I would have never have thought of that.

When I got to the city, I walked across town to where I was supposed to meet, signed a couple of papers telling how long it took me to get where I was, by what means I got there, and how much I had to pay. After that, I was free for the weekend to do what ever I wanted. Since it was official Peace Corps business, we were given per diem. That was nice. I wasn’t the only one who had to come to the city for the same reason, so people were slowly streaming in until 5 o’ clock the next morning. That gave me plenty of company for the weekend. We all had to meet at one of the older PCV’s apartment and he let us stay there for the weekend, so we had an easy time planning our activities. At first, a few of us went to Big Burger for lunch. The sign looks just like Burger King, but all the food is practically the same as McDonald’s. Unlike McDonald’s, they were out of all but two of their sandwiches, and they didn’t care if you liked it or not. No matter: I got a Big Burger (Big Mac with lots of mayo instead of the Thousand Island sauce), a chicken sandwich, and fries, and loved the heck out of it. It is amazing how you miss fast food and don’t even realise it until you take that first bite and get the fatty, artery-clogging goodness in your mouth. And I didn’t even eat it that much in the U.S. The lady looked at me weird when I asked for more than the one packet of catsup for my fries. When I asked for a third, you would’ve thought that it was coming out of her personal stash or something. I really wanted about three more packets, but I wasn’t going to push my luck. Now if I could only find a knock-off Taco Bell….

There were four of us there and two of the guys live and work in UB, so they had to go back to work. The other guy and I walked around a bit, first stopping at the State Department Store. He had never been, so he wanted to check it out. Randomly, I ran into a lady that I’d told you I met when I was at my training site. She was in town for whatever reason, so we talked for a few minutes. Then we went to the Peace Corps office to hang out for a bit. It’s open to all Volunteers 24/7, so people are there at all hours. There is a bathroom with a shower; lounge with chairs, a couch, a TV, and movies; four computers with internet; and all kinds of books. I found a few more books that I’m interested in to bring home for later. While there, one of the guards came and told us that there was a vendor outside, selling cheese. I asked if it was Mongolian cheese and he said it was. Yuck! I wasn’t the least bit interested. I don’t know what it is that makes Mongolian milk products taste the way they do, but I don’t like it at all. Not much later, another PCV came in with some of the cheese, exalting its goodness. Again, I asked if it was Mongolian cheese, but he told me it wasn’t. Sometimes, even though Mongolians speak English, they don’t really understand what you’re saying, so they don’t answer the question correctly. I tasted of the cheese, and though I’m not the biggest fan of cheese, it was so nice to have some non-Mongol cheese that I just had to get some. The guy was cutting it off of a big round, out of his microbus. I got a big ol’ hunk of it. He told me the charge was 6,000tg, but I only had 5,500tg on me, so he took that. Lucky me.

When the other guy and I left there, we decided to go bar hopping in a search for non-Mongolian beer. We had a really hard time doing it. We went to one place where they had the Czech beer Budvar (the real Budweiser), then found Heineken at another, ritzy place. While at the ritzy place, I got a hankering for a dirty martini, but the lady had never even heard of the drink, let alone know how to make it. So I showed her how. She seemed enthralled by my skills, but not the product. She made the same yuck-face that I do when I’m pressured into taking shots of vodka. When we left, we got some beer and went back to the apartment where we were staying. The guy had invited everyone for a party and we were all excited to be able to let loose with our American culture and speak English freely, without having to explain all the subtleties. There were about 15 or so of us there. At the end of the night, there were seven of us that ended up sleeping in the living room floor. It was like a regular slumber party. Quite fun. Of course, several of us talked late into the night before getting to sleep.

Saturday, six of us went to the PC office to shower. There was a shower where we were staying, but no hot water. It was glorious to be able to shave with running hot water and take a hot shower. At my apartment, I have to boil hot water and pour it in a bowl to shave with. It conserves water, which is always good, but it’s a bit of a hassle. By the time everyone had showered, we were all starving, so we went to a place called Nayra’s Cafe. I ordered the chicken pasta in white alfredo sauce. It was delicious. I love white sauce on my pasta. I wish I knew how to make it from scratch. Maybe one of you loving people can find a simple recipe and email it to me. After lunch, we split up and some of us went to the black-market. Man, that place is big. I bought another power strip to replace the one I’d blown, a coat, and a mirror for my bathroom. Until now, I’ve been using a very small hand mirror to shave with. It worked, but again, it was a hassle. I expect this to raise my quality of living by at least a notch or two. We all met up later and went to different grocery stores – since you can never find everything you need in one store – then made another stop at Big Burger before going back to pre-party. There is a club in UB called Oasis that is owned by an American expatriate and an older PCV has worked out a deal where we all get in without a cover charge. It was kind of cool there. They played a lot of music that I really like, so that’s what made it cool for me. There were a few Mongolians, and there were several American expatriates. Some of those guys are creepy and skanky. Ha, one of the Mongolian girls was flirting with one of the guys I was with. When I walked by, she proclaimed me to be the “godfather,” and had me marry the two of them. It was quite hilarious. She even kissed him when I finished my 5 second spiel. I think she had a boyfriend, but she didn’t seem very interested in what he had going on.

In Mongolia, all clubs are supposed to close at midnight, by law, but several of them stay open later. They will often pay the cops to look the other way. We left there around 2 a.m., I think. There were a couple of guys who were PCVs about five or six years ago who had an after-party, so we all went there. Unfortunately, several of the skanky expats and whacked out Mongolian girls were there, too. We stayed there for about 30 minutes before deciding that it wasn’t our scene. Before we went in, we all huddled together and decided on a signal and the person to give it, for when someone felt uncomfortable and was ready to go. As we broke, one of the guys said, “A signal? What? That’s the dumbest thing! A bunch of drunk people…pfft. Nobody’s going to remember an f-ing signal!” I giggled, having a feeling that he was right. Sure enough, when the girl that was to give the signal decided she was ready to go, I was the only one who knew what was going on. The signal was that she would say she wanted a cigarette. (She doesn’t smoke, so it should’ve been obvious that something was wrong.) I immediately said, “Okay, let’s see if we can go find you one,” and started out the door. As I waited in the hallway, people started offering her cigs, not figuring out what her deal was. Finally, enough of them got the point and we left. One girl still didn’t get it until we were walking down the road. We all got a good laugh out of it, once we were gone.

We walked across town to the apartment where we were staying and got caught in the rain. At first, I was irritated about the rain, but then I realised there was nothing that I could do about it, and it really wasn’t that bad since I had good company, so my mood brightened and I enjoyed the walk. We were dripping wet when we got there. After drying off and getting settled in our sleeping bags, a few of us stayed awake for another hour having “pillow talk.” It sounds cheesy, but it was fun. It was nice to have my idiocy appreciated by like-minded people.

This morning, we didn’t get out of the bed until almost 11 o’ clock. The latest microbus coming back to my town was to leave at 2, so I had to hurry lunch. It was good, though. We went to a vegetarian place and I had an awesome chef’s salad and some vegetarian bansh, boats, and hoshor. Very good. I’ve stuffed myself this weekend, and I’m glad I did. After having taken a taxi across town, I got to the microbus just in time for the kabob vendor to pass by. They had the kabobs ready-made, with a little fire box, rolling around on a cart. I got one, just to say I did. I had a very uneventful ride home: just like I like it. This evening, after unpacking, I’ve done nothing but lie in the bed and write this. I think I’ll go to sleep early tonight to catch up on some rest.

September 15, 2008

I got that new dictionary that I’d ordered today. When I ordered it online, the website would only accept U.S. addresses. You know, one of those forms that require a zip code. Well, as you might have noticed on my address when I sent it to you, Mongolia doesn’t have zip codes. So, as soon as I ordered it to be sent to my mom’s house, I emailed them, via their Mongolian website, and asked if they would mail it to me here, since they are based out of UB. They emailed back and said they would. That saved me over a month and a half, at least, of waiting on it; plus the extra charges for shipping it all the way back here. The dictionary has several times as many words as the one that PC gave us, but it is only English to Mongolian, and not the other way around. It’s very helpful, but it would be even more so if it translated from Mongolian to English, also. The problem is that there are so many random, new, or slang words that isn’t in my PC dictionary. It’s a bit frustrating sometimes. I think I might have worked out someone to be something like a tutor, though. I ran into the first lady that asked me to dance the other night and she asked if I would teach her English. I don’t really want to, but since I can’t find a tutor, I told her that if she’d teach me Mongolian, I’d teach her English. It will be very informal, so maybe it won’t be so bad. I’ll let you know how it goes. I’m sure the both of us will pick up something from the interchange.

September 17, 2008

For the last couple of days, my stomach has been upset. At first, I thought it was just because I’d eaten so much in UB, but after the first night, I knew that wasn’t the case. There wasn’t any diarrhoea involved, luckily, but it still sucked. And for some reason, it would ease off during the day, then come back full force about an hour before I went to bed and torment me all through the night. I thought that I’d call into work yesterday, but when I woke up, I felt alright enough to go. Then, this morning, I had a sore throat on top of my upset stomach. I think I got the sore throat from my boss. She went to the city for the doctor yesterday, to get her sore throat checked out. Since I knew there was nothing going on at work, and I could use the rest, I told them that I was going to stay home. On top of all that annoyance, our water is out. It has been since late last night. Luckily, my one co-worker that is left in town is as nice as everyone else. She came by early in the morning to check on me, when she’d heard I was sick, and she brought me about a litre and a half of water, also. I’ve used it sparingly, leaving enough to wash my hair and shave in the morning. I haven’t washed my hands all day. I can’t tell you how much that has distressed me today. I was told the water was supposed to be back on this evening, but it isn’t. Like most everything else here, there’s no telling when it will be back on. I’ll be raring for a bath when it does come on.

September 18, 2008

My sore throat is gone, for the most part, but as always with me, that is only the beginning signs of a cold. Already, my sinuses have begun to get stuffed up. This is my first cold since being in Mongolia. Back home, in the clime of AL, I would stay stuffed up for weeks, blowing snot until I thought my nose was going to fall off. We’ll see how long the aridity allows that to persist here. Maybe the Mucinex I took will help a bit, also.

My water is still off this evening. For some reason, though, there is water at my office building. I rounded up all the empty bottles I had (about two gallons worth) and filled them up at work, brought them home and emptied them into my filter and distiller, and then filled them again. It’s a good thing I hadn’t taken my trash out yet. I don’t know what I would’ve done if I didn’t have those empty two litre juice and beer bottles. My co-worker told me that the water at work would be cut off tomorrow. I’m not sure exactly what’s going on, but they dug the streets up a few days ago and have been doing some kind of work on the pipes. I can’t wait til they get it where I don’t have to worry about whether the water will be here or not. I was told that the power will be out, also. Drat! Good thing I have plenty of bread and peanut butter for my meals.

September 19, 2008

I know you all have been wondering where I am. I haven’t been able to access the internet here at work this week. Finally, just about 30 minutes ago, the IT guy and I finished running wire from my office to his. I have internet in my office now!! Yay! So, I’ll post this now. I hope everyone is good. Write or call when you can. If you call, remember that I’m 12 hours ahead of you. I don’t mind talking at anytime, but if I’m asleep, it might take me a minute or two to be coherent. Other than that, I won’t mind at all.


P.S. If this posts twice, I'm sorry. I've told you how stupid the internet is here.